Friday, July 6

If you were expecting Private Empire, the latest book by two-time Pulitzer Prize winning author Steve
Coll, to serve as a hit piece on ExxonMobil (and 'Big Oil' in general) you’ll be somewhat disappointed.

For anyone unfamiliar with his previous work, Steve Coll’s
earlier books include the highly recommended Ghost
Wars, arguably the definitive geopolitical account of the activities of
the CIA and other national intelligence agencies in Afghanistan and Pakistan
from the time of the Soviet invasion up to the eve of the 9-11. Ghost Wars won the Pulitzer Prize in 2004
for general non-fiction and was one of the books a newly elected President
Barrack Obama was reported to be reading upon entering office.

Steve Coll describes in an interview with Charlie
Rose what lead him to want to write Private Empire and how his original idea for the book was to tell a broader story about the oil industry in the style of Daniel Yergin’s The Prize. He soon realized, however,
that he needed a central character and Exxon was for him the only logical
choice.

Coll’s portrait of Exxon begins in March 1989 with the Exxon
Valdez oil spill in Prince William Sound, Alaska, an event which made the
company the most reviled in the United Sates. The book’s timeline spans the
subsequent transformation of the company, which was led by CEO Lee “Iron Ass” Raymond, up
through its present day stewardship by current CEO Rex Tillerson. Along the way
we learn a great deal about Exxon, including its somewhat peculiar cult-like corporate
culture, its blockbuster merger with Mobil, its controversial stance and
efforts on global warning, the access it enjoyed to political leaders such as
Vice President Dick Cheney, its somewhat misleading approach to reporting oil
reserves, and the company’s record setting financial success. The book in fact
makes for a compelling business case study and students of business history,
strategy and management will find much of interest.

The most interesting sections of the book are the ones detailing ExxonMobil’s operations in some of the world’s most politically
unstable regions. ExxonMobil’s bread and butter business is to invest billions
of dollars drilling holes in the ground in countries like Equatorial Guinea and
Chad and then spend the next 30-40 years working to make sure that nothing
interrupts the company's return on investment. Coll’s account of the 2004 attempted coup
in Equatorial Guinea by a group of British and South African mercenaries, who were supported from some elements within the Spanish government, is one of the most fascinating
stories in the book.